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Teleportation record heralds
secure global network
(May 16, 2012) The distance
record for quantum
teleportation has been smashed. Juan Yin and colleagues at
the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei, Anhui,
teleported a quantum state 97 kilometers, 81 km further than the
previous record. Yin's team entangle photons – which links
their properties even when the photons are separated. Then they
beam one photon from each entangled pair to a point A and the
other to B.
Read
more. New Scientist |
Dust rings not 'smoking
gun' for planets after all
(May 15, 2012) There can
be smoke without fire. Sharp rings of dust around stars aren't
always carved by planets but can form on their own – bad news
for those who use the structures to guide them to stars that host
planets. The finding also has implications for the existence of
a controversial candidate exoplanet.
Read
more. New Scientist |
Earth-facing sunspots could
erupt this weekend
(May 13, 2012) Space weather
forecasters are keeping a close watch on a large collection of
sunspots that could
unleash blasts of energy or charged particles toward Earth in
the coming days. Sunspot region 1476, the dark patch resembling
the Hawaiian Islands in the photo at left, is located near the
center of the Sun’s face as seen from Earth but has yet to act
out in any major way.
Read
more. Scientific American |
Asteroid Vesta is 'last
of a kind' rock
(May 11, 2012) Vesta
is the only remaining example of the original objects that came
together to form the rocky planets, like Earth and Mars, some
4.6 billion years ago. This assessment is based on data from the
Dawn probe which has been orbiting the second largest body in
the asteroid belt for the past 10 months. The findings from the
Nasa mission are reported in Science magazine.
Read
more. BBC |
James Webb telescope's
'first light' instrument ready to ship
(May 10, 2012) One of Europe's
main contributions to the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is
built and ready to ship to the US. The Mid-Infrared Instrument
(MIRI) will gather key data as the $9bn observatory seeks to identify
the first starlight in the Universe.The results of testing conducted
at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in the UK have just been
signed off, clearing Miri to travel to America. James Webb –
regarded as the successor to Hubble – is due to launch in
2018.
Read
more. BBC |
Spitzer sees the light
of alien super-Earth
(May 9, 2012) NASA's Spitzer
Space Telescope has detected light emanating from a "super-Earth"
planet (55 Cancri e) beyond our solar system for the first time.
While the planet is not habitable, the detection is a historic
step toward the eventual search for signs of life on other planets.
Read
more. NASA/JPL |
Hot Jupiters oust their
siblings
(May 8, 2012) If, in the
early days of the Solar System, if Jupiter had encountered another
giant planet and been thrown closer to the Sun it could have tossed
all the inner planets, including the Earth, out of their orbits.
Exactly this scenario seems to have happened in some extrasolar
planetary systems which contain so-called hot Jupiters.
Read
more. New Scientist |
LHC prepares for data pile-up
(May 7, 2012) The world's
largest particle accelerator is roaring along at an unprecedented
pace, delivering torrents of data to its physicist handlers. But
the hundreds of millions of collisions happening inside the machine
every second are now growing into a thick fog that, paradoxically,
threatens to obscure a fabled quarry: the Higgs
boson.
Read
more. Nature |
Space weather expert has
ominous forecast
(May 6, 2012) A stream of
highly charged particles from the Sun is headed straight toward
Earth, threatening to plunge cities around the world into darkness
and bring the global economy screeching to a halt. This isn't
the premise of the latest doomsday thriller. Massive solar storms
have happened before – and another one is likely to occur
soon, according to Mike Hapgood, a space weather scientist at
the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory near Oxford, England.
Read
more. Los Angeles Times |
Black hole caught red-handed
in a stellar homicide
(May 4, 2012) Astronomers
have gathered the most direct evidence yet of a supermassive
black hole shredding a star that wandered too close. NASA's
Galaxy Evolution Explorer, a space-based observatory, and the
Pan-STARRS1 telescope on the summit of Haleakala in Hawaii were
among the first to help identify the stellar remains.
Read
more. NASA/JPL |
ESA approves Jupiter's
moons mission
(May 3, 2012) ESA has given
the go-ahead to a one billion euro space mission to explore the
icy moons of Jupiter. The Juice (Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer) mission
will investigate the possibility of "waterworlds" that may harbor
life. It will amke multiple close flyby's of Europa and Caliisto
before entering orbit around Ganymede,
the Solar System's biggest moon.
Read
more. The Guardian |
California meteorite is
rare rock laden with organics
(May 2, 2012) A meteorite
that landed in northern California last week is much more valuable
than scientists first thought. It turns out to be a very rare
type of rock called a CM chondrite, which makes up less than 1
per cent of the meteorites that fall to Earth. This is the same
type as the Murchison
meteorite, which landed in Australia in 1969 and is now one
of the most studied rocks in the world.
Read
more. New Scientist |
Ancient asteroids kept
on coming
(May 1, 2012) A pair of
studies published in Nature suggests that the early battering
the Earth endured from asteroids lasted much longer than previously
thought, spanning nearly the entire first half of Earth's history.
The results imply that a prolonged succession of impacts –
some of them large enough to vaporize oceans – could have
shaped the early evolution of life.
Read
more. Nature |
Did supernovas boost life
on Earth?
(Apr 30, 2012) Research
by Henrik Svensmark of the Technical University of Denmark suggests
that the explosion of massive stars – supernovae –
near the Solar System has strongly influenced the development
of life. Whenever the Sun and its planets have visited regions
of enhanced star formation in the Milky Way Galaxy, where exploding
stars are most common, life has prospered. Svensmark remarks in
his paper, "The biosphere seems to contain a reflection of the
sky, in that the evolution of life mirrors the evolution of the
Galaxy."
Read
more. Astrobiology Magazine |
Meteorites from giant fireball
over California found
(Apr 28, 2012) Tiny meteorites
found in northern California were part of a giant fireball that
exploded over the weekend with about one-third the explosive force
of the atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima in World War II. The rocks
each weighed about 10 grams, or the weight of two nickels, said
John T. Wasson, a longtime professor and expert in meteorites
at UCLA's Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics.
Read
more. Daily Telegraph |
The strange spirals of
Mars
(Apr 27, 2012) Some say
the northern valley of Mars
formed in fire, some say in ice: now curious spirals on the floor
of the valley have been glimpsed – and hold with those who
favor fire. Graduate student Andrew Ryan of Arizona State University
and colleagues seem to have settled the debate with their discovery
of these strange markings, which could only be formed from lava.
Read
more. New Scientist |
Meteor over California
and Nevada was size of minivan
(Apr 25, 2012) The fireball
that streaked brightly across the daytime sky on Sunday, and was
seen from Sacramento in the north to Las Vegas in the south, may
have weighed 70 tons and measured 15 feet across. The meteor disintegrated
before hitting the ground, releasing the energy of a five-kiloton
explosion in the process, according to the NASA release.
Read
more. CNN |
Plans for asteroid mining
emerge
(Apr 25, 2012) Details have
been emerging of the plan by billionaire entrepreneurs to mine
asteroids for their
resources. The multi-million-dollar plan would use robotic spacecraft
to squeeze chemical components of fuel and minerals such as platinum
and gold out of the rocks. The founders include film director
and explorer James Cameron as well as Google's chief executive
Larry Page and its executive chairman Eric Schmidt.
Read
more. BBC |
Cassini sees objects blazing
trails in Saturn ring
(Apr 24, 2012) Scientists
working with images from the Cassini spacecraft have discovered
strange half-mile-sized (kilometer-sized) objects punching through
parts of Saturn's F ring, leaving glittering trails behind them.
These trails in the rings, which scientists are calling "mini-jets,"
fill in a missing link in our story of the curious behavior of
the F ring.
Read
more. NASA/JPL |
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